haleyheadswest-blog

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Yellowstone & The Grand Tetons: Leslie Knope Would’ve Been Into It.

Isn’t it funny how, when we’re at a famous site or landmark or location, we all pull out our phones, eager to capture what’s in front of us—even though it’s been photographed so many times before? How we try to keep our hands from shaking while extending them out, over other people’s heads, desperate to pause what we’re seeing, the legend of whatever site or landmark or location it is standing in front of us, how we save it or share it or send it to our loved ones, look where I am! Look what I see!

I’m thinking about this a lot at Yellowstone, overlooking a terrifyingly steep waterfall deep in the park, sandwiched between my parents and about forty other tourists milling about the concrete platform with selfie sticks and professional cameras and iPhones and even polaroid cameras. There’s probably a far better picture of this waterfall in the gift shop for sale at an admittedly steep price. There are definitely tons of perfect shots online, all a Google search away. And yet, here we all are, huddling over the edge of the fence, each of our lens pointed at the same thing.

But it’s impossible to fully capture the brilliance of it all—the way the water falls over the side of the rocks and darts in a white sheet of sheer force down to the water below, exploding in an swallowing splash and spitting down the river until it finally slows and calms in the shade of the valleys. A video can’t capture it all: the start, the climax, the slow finish. A picture most certainly can’t begin to tell this water’s story. It’s overwhelming and beautiful and scary all at once, and there’s no way any of our pictures can say all of that.

We’re in the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone—perhaps a less creative name than what could’ve been, but it’s a canyon, and it’s grand, so it fits. We’ve been driving through the park all day, stopping at random to see steaming geysers and rivers and even herds of bison stand lazily in the barren fields. I think about how cars look so out of place here, metal and smoke against a backdrop of beige grass.

Regardless, it’s incredible that national parks exist—expanses of land, saved for their beauty! There’s little-to-no internet access here, and aside from those aforementioned cars and a few general stores and gas stations and lodges throughout the massive park, it’s the most natural place I’ve seen in a long time. No commercialization, no connection to the outside world, just the land, the animals, and the occasional sign warning people to carry bear spray.

I’ll admit it: I’m a little terrified of the prospect of bears. My mom found a book in one of the general stores all about ways in which visitors of the park have died. She tells me about one guy who hiked off the trail (against all advice) and eventually got mauled by a bear. What a wonderful thing to share with your daughter—the daughter that loves entertaining irrational fears and rational fears alike, a long list that now includes bears!

While in Yellowstone, we stay at a lodge with a main lobby and dining area in a grand wooden building. Guests stay in the tiny cabins behind this building. It costs $5 an hour to get on the WiFi. I swallow my self-hatred and type my credit card number into my computer. I guess the beauty of nature isn’t quite enough to keep me entertained.

Mom, Dad, and I agree that the food served at our Yellowstone lodge is the worst yet—cafeteria style, kind of cold, semi-terrible choices. We also agree that we feel like we’re at camp, eating off of plates on trays in a giant dining room, surrounded by muffled chatter and an air of excitement.

Our next day is spent in the Grand Tetons. We do a hike near Jenny Lake up to Inspiration Point. It’s beautiful, aside from the signs reminding us to keep bear spray at hand, which we do not have. Even more thrilling is the discovery of a dock at the end of the hike, where we are invited to get on a boat back to the parking lot from which we started. This is how all hikes should go: tough incline, stunning view, boat that luxuriously floats you back to the starting point.

We chugged water bottles and shared a bag of barbecue chips on our way over to Jackson, where we went up in cable cars over the mountains and ate a homemade waffle smothered in butter and maple syrup 10,000 feet up. And when we happened upon a mountain bike course where riders performed stunts on steep ramps and wheelies, we decided to settle in at a nearby restaurant patio with local IPAs and watch, mesmerized by wheels in the air and the helmeted people controlling them.

Our next lodge overlooks the stunning outline of the Grand Tetons, a stunning expanse of the Rocky Mountains. We have wine and a cheese plate while watching the sunset of the rigidity of them in the distance, and it’s beautiful, and here we all were, whipping our phones out to capture the beauty once again. Mine are all terrible.

But maybe the point of taking all of these pictures isn’t because they’re going to be the best. There’s no way—not with National Geographic photographers (among many others) capturing the uncaptureable better than the rest of us. Maybe we’re just trying to take a piece of it for ourselves, bottling up a feeling rather than a sight, an experience rather than something we’ll simply frame.

We leave the national parks early on Saturday morning, heading to the quaint town of Bozeman, Montana. I watch as my cell service slowly comes back, as the winding roads in the park slowly transform into the straight one that makes up I-90. I won’t lie—I love the world we’ve created, the one with easy communication and restaurants that serve beautifully plated food on aesthetically pleasing plates and air conditioning and a delightful lack of bears, but I suddenly feel an appreciation for the opposite of all that, for hills that host nothing but trees, for geysers that bubble and hiss and steam, for waterfalls that utterly terrify me, even for signs that remind me how delicate I am, that a bear could kill me if I’m not careful. Okay, maybe I don’t miss that part, but I took a picture of the sign anyway.

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Mt. Rushmore, Crazy Horse, and Calamity Jane, Oh My!

Everyone knows Mt. Rushmore. Four giant heads carved into a mountain? Hard to miss (and it’s on every American history textbook cover across the country). However, its location in lovely South Dakota makes it a destination. You’ve really gotta wanna see those heads to make the trip (at least in my expert opinion).

That’s why, when my mom and I planned our trip, we agreed that seeing Mt. Rushmore was a must—partially for its infamy, partially because I don’t have major plans to return to South Dakota in the near future. Good reasons, I know.

Of course, before we saw the founding fathers, we had to go grab my darling father from the airport (though he couldn’t join us for the whole road trip, he didn’t want to miss out on the fun and bought a plane ticket two weeks prior to my departure date). Mom and I ended up arriving to the Rapid City Regional Airport a liiiiittle late because of an emergency (read: I found a dope coffee shop that served homemade poptarts and lattes with pretty foam art. It was only a little out of the way! I swear!). We also rearranged all of my belongings in the backseat and trunk of my car in order to fit another adult human in the vehicle. Let’s just say the backseat would be a claustrophobe’s nightmare.

ANYWAY. Here’s what you should do if you decide to venture out to this joyous western region:

Go to Bear Country. My mom and I actually did this before picking up my dad. Here’s what you do: drive through this fenced off area outside of Rapid City. See cute little wolves. See cute little bison. See cute little mountain goats. And OMG see cute little bears! And by cute and little, I mean slightly terrifying and massive. There’s also a zoo-like walking portion, where an entire pinned-off area of BABY BEARS are playing in the water, climbing trees, and frolicking about. Am I still scared of bears? Yes. Do I kind of want one as a pet? Also yes.

See Mt. Rushmore. Duh. Like I said before, it’s a legendary spot. The giant stone heads of dear ole George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Teddy Roosevelt, and Abe Lincoln are accompanied by a great museum and a gift shop for miles. Bonus: you will also run into some of the most entertaining tourist outfits (I’m talking people wearing freshly purchased Mt. Rushmore t-shirts while taking a picture of themselves in front of Mt. Rushmore with a selfie stick. Amazing, I know).

See Crazy Horse. A lesser known giant mountain carving is just down the road, featuring the famous Native American “Crazy Horse.” This monument is still in the works—while Crazy Horse’s face is completed, the area where his horse and outstretched arm will be are still solid rock. My parents joked that I will be able to bring my grandkids to see the finished Crazy Horse monument one day. I guess I’ll be returning to South Dakota after all.

Drive along Needle Highway. Cool tall rocks, winding roads, and deep caverns? Enough said!

Reserve the Calamity Jane cabin at McDonald farm in Keystone, SD. You will feel like a character out of Little House on the Prairie—log walls, patchwork quilts, and no cell service! Just like old times!

After a rousing time doing all the aforementioned delights (and finding ample coffee and red wine along the way), the next stop is Cody, Wyoming. Unfortunately, this stop will be preceded by a seven hour drive through the absolute middle of NOWHERE. Strap in and don’t gauge your eyes out!

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South Dakota and the surrounding nowheres!

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A Rundown of a Few Days in a Few Places

Here is the truth: I want to blog every day. Here is another truth: I also wanted to finish the book Mrs. Fletcher and drink wine with my mom and explore some of the more bizarre stops of the trip. Those two truths collided into this: I’m still going to talk about every day, but it’s going to be pressed into this post.

I’m currently sitting on the porch of a cabin with a glass of red wine (good) and spotty wifi (interesting) and no cell service (I hope I don’t get murdered here). We’re somewhere on the outskirts of Keystone, South Dakota, but to get here, I have to go back to 48 hours ago on I-90.

Fun fact: after Chicago, there’s not a lot going on along I-90. Well, I guess if you’re into wind energy it’s a very exciting drive, because we probably passed upwards of a thousand wind turbines. Anyway, if you ever find yourself in our exact situation, which was both searching for entertaining places to stop along the absolutely barren highway and looking for a hotel about seven hours from Chicago that doesn’t look like the perfect backdrop for a countryside murder, here is a list of scenarios you can execute:

1. Listen to a very inspiring episode of This American Life while sharing a family-sized bag of white cheddar popcorn. Apologize to no one.

2. Finally find a Hampton Inn in Fairmont, Minnesota and immediately book a room. Luke the Concierge will be the one to help you book said room, and he will later be the one to recommend a nice grill in town.

3. When you learn that the Luke-the-Concierge-approved grill closes at 8 PM (and since you’re a fun, urban, young person, it’s 8:10 when you want dinner), you’ll have to scramble to find something new. At this point, you’ll realize that almost every restaurant in Fairmont closes at 8—except for the one attached to the rival hotel: The Holiday Inn. You have no allegiances. You’re there three minutes later, tearing apart the stale bread in the basket and staring at the bar, which is crowded with every male from the town in celebration of the football draft. You’ll wonder, why am I moving to Seattle when Fairmont offers such an exciting and lively culture???

4. Hampton Inns are the same across the country, so you’ll feel right at home in the hotel room that has the same comforters and lamps and reprinted art as the Hampton Inn you stayed in earlier that year during your high school coaching stint. This will be comforting until you turn on the VMAs, which were wildly uncomfortable this year. Sorry, Katy Perry.

5. In the morning, your only option for breakfast is McDonalds. Egg McMuffins and black coffee it is. It’s time to get back on the road. As you drive, stop at the ridiculous attractions advertised incessantly on dozens of neon billboards. Such attractions may include:

The Corn Palace, aka the only corn palace in the world. That’s right folks, South Dakota has a real treasure right here. It’s free to go in and it takes a full three minutes to see everything there is to see!

Wall Drug, a delightfully kitschy western street with jackolopes mounted on almost every surface and sprawling gift shops and also an electronic dinosaur in the corner of a hallway…? IDK. It was strange. Their website, however, is surprisingly aesthetically pleasing: http://www.walldrug.com/

This brings us to our second location of today’s post: Rapid City, South Dakota.

Rapid City can be described in three words: cute, quaint, flat. We stayed at the Rushmore Hotel, which lived up to its name across the board. The walls in our hotel room had Mt. Rushmore on them. The floor by the concierge had a tiled version of Mt. Rushmore. There was even a glass case with a mini Mt. Rushmore in it. Keep in mind that Mt. Rushmore is a solid thirty minutes away from this hotel and completely out of view. You’d never know it, though!

Here’s how my mom and i spent the afternoon in Rapid City:

Walked along Main Street. There are cute shops, a brewery, and not much else.

Got beers at said brewery. Decent IPAs. Oh, joy.

Went back to hotel and laid on hotel beds until it was time to go to dinner.

Ate at a steak house. We were excited about the menu until we learned the restaurant was entirely out of fish. Have I mentioned I’m a pescatarian? Ordered appetizers and split a bottle of rosé with my mom to cope.

Got a cocktail at the hotel afterwards. Noticed that the average age in Rapid City was 80 and the average outfit included a fanny pack and Sketchers shape-ups.

Decided to unwind before bed with the calming and uplifting film, D’Jango Unchained. Slept so soundly after that one!

My dad comes tomorrow and our real western adventure will begin with Mt. Rushmore. You guessed it: stay tuned.

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Chicagooooo (8/26/2017 - 8/27/2017) I love Chicago. I love the way it all glitters: the water and the skyscrapers and the cars and the people. I was here last in 2014 with one of dearest friends from college. We spent our three day trip drinking blue moons in dark comedy clubs and taking distorted selfies in the side of the bean. I texted her as my mom and I drove down Lakeshore Drive: I’m in our city without you :( But it’s not just our city. It’s home to so much—deep dish pizza, the Bears, Lincoln Park (where we grabbed sashimi before heading to our destination), and a bulk of my mom’s friends from her alma mater, Indiana University. That’s how we ended up in La Grange, a Chicago suburb that could easily have been the set for an HBO dramedy about the intertwining lives of four families with seemingly perfect lives that, as the season wears on, are revealed to be peppered with dark secrets…I digress. In this instance, La Grange is home to two college friends: Jules and Jane (yes, all of my mom’s friends have names that start with J. This coincidence is not beyond us). Both have adorable families and furry pets and a love for retelling the past—my mother’s ridiculous wedding, for example: “the bartender had to cut us off,” they both laughed over mixed drinks—Deep Eddy’s Grapefruit vodka and grapefruit La Croix and a splash of orange juice, in case you were wondering. I love watching my mother and her friends. Jules, her college roommate, and Jane, her postgrad roommate, both knew my mom when she was my age—something I often forget she ever was. They talk about old friends, about when my mom began dating my dad, and my favorite: the “makeout chair.” I sit mostly in silence, watching them laugh, remember, and it’s warm, wonderful. Maybe my mom and I have been out of the loop for a bit, but when we had arrived to La Grange in the first place, Jules’ husband Steve greeted my mom and I with big hugs and, with poorly hidden excitement, said, “I bought the fight!” He, of course, was referring to the overhyped boxing match between Mayweather and McGregor, but my mom and I were not aware this was a scheduled event. “There’s a fight tonight?” I said. “Starts at eleven!” And suddenly, an event I knew nothing about became the centerpoint of my time in Chicago. The fight, I learned, cost $99, and Steve was one of the few neighbors who had shelled out the big bucks to watch packed punches and reddened skin in HD. Their living room was soon crowded with suburban male testosterone. I fit in perfectly in my overalls and pained expression every time Mayweather’s glove met McGregor’s cheek. Thank god for Deep Eddy’s Grapefruit vodka for making the blow a little more tolerable. The next morning, we sat at Jules’ kitchen table looking at her wedding album. I laughed at a picture of my mother, two steps down from Jules in a cerulean blue dress with shoes to match. “Those were in style,” she said defensively. “Aw, and there’s Marty. Does he still live around the corner?” “He does,” Jules said. “Let’s see if he’s up!” He was, and that was how the tail-end of our time in La Grange was spent in the most incredible house I’ve ever set foot in—and no, it’s not because of the high ceilings or dance studio or the handcrafted furniture. It was because of the birds. It started off simply enough: a parrot balancing on a golden ring in the family room. Marty, who was another dear IU alum, showed us how the parrot would kiss him and promptly fart loudly right after. “Every time!” Marty was cackling. “Let’s go outside. The chickens!” Three adorable chickens emerged from the shrubs near his back door, pecking at the worms and cornmeal in Marty’s outstretched hand. And then, we rounded the corner to a square pen containing one eighty pound tortoise named Rico. And then, a cage of birds near the side of the house. And then, the aviary. Now, I’ve been in a few aviaries in my twenty-four years—they were just always at zoos. Never have I stepped into a home aviary—much less one in a basement and decorated like an bohemian Anthropologie display. Rustic wooden and metal walls, sumptuous couches, and a giant room of upwards of thirty birds: a peacock, some parrots, some brightly colored smaller ones, a hairless guinea pig, a fluffy rabbit named Nora, to name a few. “That one,” Marty pointed at a bird pecking at the ground, “his name is Chris Brown. I’ve given him three girlfriends to mate with, and he keeps beating them up and killing them!” Chris Brown the bird does not see offended by this clear insult. We step into the glass room and I wondered if I should have paid more attention in school to what bird flu was. Marty gives me two vibrant parrot feathers to take. I joke about making them earrings, and then wonder if that would actually be possible. When we left, I thought about how maybe I was kind of like a bird—leaving the nest, flying away, but the metaphor felt too cliché, so instead I looked up the menu of the place we’d be getting brunch. Brunch would be with another blast from the past who, yes, has a name that starts with a “J.” Jackie, another college roommate, met us over steaming cups of black coffee and cheesy omelets at a restaurant right off the busy streets of downtown Chicago. If Jackie were a holiday, she would be Fourth of July, every statement and movement not unlike a firecracker—bright, exciting, joyous. We stayed for three refills of coffee before tearing ourselves from the table and hugging her goodbye. Sadly, our destination was bleak. “We’ll need to find a hotel somewhere along the highway,” my mom said, handing me her iPad. “There’s an AmericInn. That’s punny.” I drag my finger along I-90, quickly realizing that our next stop would probably not be as dazzling as Chicago. And that will bring me to our next stop soon: Fairmont (aka the middle of bumfuck NOWHERE, USA). Oh joy!

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Chicago, baby!

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Fun and Unpopular Opinion: St. Louis has Great Food 8/25/2017 - 8/26/2017 Greetings from the middle-of-nowhere, Illinois! My mom and I left St. Louis about three hours ago, and there have been little-to-no changes in scenery: trees, trucks, the occasional wind turbine, and some inspiring messages about the importance of keeping America safe with lots of guns. Oh happy day! St. Louis, fortunately, was much more exciting. My mom was particularly pleased because St. Louis is not only home to the Gateway Arch, but also home to her childhood. More importantly, St. Louis is also home to Judy (my mom’s best friend from middle school, high school, and beyond), her husband Todd (another dear friend from high school and beyond), and their wheaten-terrier-poodle named Chili (not a high school friend, but perhaps the most important character we’ve seen thus far). Our time in St. Louis was dictated by food and nostalgia, in this order: 1.Arrived at Judy and Todd’s beautiful home in the St. Louis suburbs. Their house has the perfect balance of art and fantastically posed pictures of their three children. Also, Chili was there, so I was ready to give up the road trip and just stay there. 2. Went to The Hill for the first St. Louis specialty of our 24 hours: toasted ravioli. We also agreed that Rosé was the only option in terms of beverages. The Italian entrees that arrived at our tables two glasses in would’ve been incredibly delicious even if I wasn’t perfectly buzzed and watching my mother revert to her high school self with her friends. 3. I suggested (read: insisted) that we stop at the legendary Ted Drewe’s—home of the concrete (which I soon learned was the inspiration for the Dairy Queen blizzard…well played, Dairy Queen). I was overwhelmed by the menu—so much so that after my mom ordered, my mind went blank and I asked for the same thing. Fortunately, she picked something with brownies and caramel swirl, so I finished mine in three minutes and then conveniently remembered how lactose intolerant I was. 4. However, I quickly dismissed my lactose intolerance when Judy offered me a bite of her concrete. I don’t even remember the flavor—just that Judy was wonderful and let me eat her dessert with gusto. 5. Todd may be the most sentimental person i have ever met—he takes pictures of everything and saves them all in scrapbooks, which are kept in order of year in their basement cabinets. Of course, that meant we let our Ted Drewes digest while looking at pictures of Todd, Judy, and my mother in high school—shout out particularly to my mom and Judy for having the most hideous collection of sweaters I’ve ever seen. Additionally, all of the pictures looked like they had the Nashville filter from Instagram on top of them, except it was the actual tone of the picture! How retro! How fun! Urban Outfitters will probably start selling photos from the 70s for $35 a pop and call them the original Instagrams. You’re welcome, Urban Outfitters. 6. In the morning, we ate poppy seed bagels on the porch and Todd and my mother decided that they, along with their spouses, would rent a Winnebago and drive across the country together, but stay in hotels overnight. This detail is not super necessary to the recap of St. Louis, but I feel like it describes the personalities of Todd and my mother perfectly. 7. We drove to my mom’s childhood home in a neighboring town called Chesterfield. We took pictures of her in front of it, and she showed me which window was the one to her bedroom, which she also insisted she never snuck out of during high school. We also passed Judy’s house, which was a few streets over. We ended the tour of sentiment at Parkway Central High School, where my mother peaked as homecoming queen and Todd and Judy started dating—truly a historic site in the bustling city of St. Louis. 8. After we hugged Todd and Judy and Chili (and Todd and my mother reconfirmed the aforementioned plan to rent a Winnebago), my mom and I headed to the Gateway Arch in order to ensure we were as touristy as possible in her hometown. We did what all dedicated tourists do: complained about the heat, asked a park ranger to take our photo in front of the site, and then retreated into an air conditioned coffee shop for gooey butter cake and caffeine. And that brings us once again to middle-of-nowhere, Illinois. Next stop: Chicago.

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St. Louis, MO

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Five Things We Did in Nashville, TN (and One Thing We Didn’t Do) 8/24/2017 - 8/25/2017 I’d only been to Nashville once before today. It was in 2010, for a swim meet during my junior year of high school. That said, my memories of Nashville are soaked in the scent of chlorine and not much else. It would be an understatement to say I was excited to replace my impression of Nashville with something new. Here are six things that were better than the Tracy Caulkins Natatorium a la moody-high-school-swimmer-Haley: 1. Live on the Greens Festival: It so happened that our time in Nashville coincided with a free concert featuring The Weeks, Portugal. The Man, and Spoons. My mom and I found ourselves in a crowd of Vanderbilt boys, all of whom thought the perfect way to enjoy a concert included blowing thick tufts of smoke into each other’s faces, taking snapchats of the crowd, and not paying attention to the stage at all. 2. Ramen Bowls from a Food Truck (whose name I cannot remember): I ate a bowl of steaming noodles and mushrooms, appropriately named “The Shroomin.” My mom and I contemplated eating our bowls on the crowded stairs by the lawn, but ultimately decided basking in the glow of The Daily Show while resting back on the plush headboards in our hotel was a better move. 3. Wall Murals of Instruments: There’s not much to say about these aside from the fact that they’re nice and colorful and I imagine many Instagrams have been taken in front of them. 4. The Grammy Exhibit at Musician’s Hall of Fame: My mom and I gave it our all to enjoy the exhibits detailing the production and creative process of musical legends such as Johnny Cash, Elvis, Buddy Holly, Neil Young and others, but we ended up spending 45 minutes watching the Grammy video compilation of past performances, including Kanye West’s high school band routine for “Gold Digger,” P!nk’s acrobatic routine, Beyonce’s controversial performance this past year, and Kendrick Lamar’s incredible performance of “Alight”—all videos we could’ve looked up on YouTube for free from our hotel or elsewhere. $20 well spent. 5. Over easy eggs and coffee. If a breakfast is good, it will make my list of positives during a trip. Though my mom and I both agreed that the interior of The Wild Egg was not unlike a nursing home dining room, the eggs were fab and the waitress left the pot of coffee at the table, allowing us to totally fulfill our caffeine addictions. 6. No swimming. Truly, this is one of the things I appreciated during our time in Nashville. A latex cap did not grip my head nor did my body have to brace for impact while jumping into the warm-up pool. The fact that swimming at the Tracy Caulkins Natatorium did not occur during our time in Nashville was a highlight. Next step: St. Louis.

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Pictures of Nashville

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1. Intro

This morning, my mom and I got in my fourteen-year-old car, which we’d packed with my clothes, my shoes, my desk, a few dusty books that I can’t bring myself to leave behind, and not much else.

“52 more hours of driving,” my mom said as she started the engine. I thought about what 52 hours of driving looked like, all of them piling on top of each other until we finally reach Seattle, but it was too much to think about, so instead I stared at my house as we pulled away from the curb.

Everything is changing. Everything! I just quit my job and signed a lease for a house in a city 3,000 miles away from my family and friends and dogs and everything else that has defined home up until now. People have been asking why I decided to leave and I never know quite what to say. Lately, I’ve been blaming the heat in Charlotte. I feel like I’m melting down every day, only to refreeze later–a weird, misshapen version of myself.

Of course, it’s a lot more than that. But when I try to explain why–that I feel like there are a few rare moments in which a person can selfishly leave behind their current life in order to chase a dream or vision or other vague word used to describe an idyllic future–I fumble over my words, ultimately apologizing and then apologizing for apologizing.

The world has never been more exciting, but the world has also never been more terrifying. I’ve been anxious about it since I decided to make the move. I was with my mother when I broke down crying in a Starbucks about a month ago, freaking out about how insane I was to leave everything I’d ever known for absolute uncertainty. She listened intently, said all the right things, hugged me. She must’ve also told my brother about it, because later that day, he texted me:

“You’re going to look back to this time in a few years and be so happy that you made the decisions that you did.” And then a second text: “Everything works out in the end.” I don’t know that things actually work out or if it’s just us telling ourselves that things are working out, but I wanted to hug my brother then, to fully believe in and subscribe to that thought, that this would be something I’d look back on and say, yes, yes, YES, I’m glad that I made the choices that I did. Part of me feels it fully. The other part is skeptical, but that part of me also wants to scream fuck it, to step on the gas and drive those 3,000 miles and meet new people and experience new things and cry in new places, to feel exhausted and scared but also exhilarated and engaged somewhere bright and foreign to me.

So I’m doing it. I’m moving across the country, to the opposite coast, to a city where I can count the people I know on one hand. My mom and I are making a road trip out of it, stopping through cities along the way. I’m hoping to catalog that experience here, so hey! Stay tuned!

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We've all been there

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Two ways to look at it

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I'm about to do over 52 hours of driving and this is my current mental state

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Rinse and repeat

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Put it in park